Harry Potter and His New Standards

* Chapter 7 - Seeing Green, Pat-Pat The Puffskein, & Something Lurking In The Forest *

Harry had pushed the thoughts of Cho out of his mind as completely as he could. If something was meant to happen between them-it would and he wouldn't have to go on about worrying about it. Friday was all together, pretty uneventful. Hermione was in a perfectly cheerful mood because she had Shaveire Studies that afternoon... Holly and Ron wouldn't talk to each other, but not out of anger. Holly was just being wary of him and Ron confirmed she was "barking mad". Except for a happening after Potions-there was nothing special going on. So, naturally, in class the long desk had Ron at the far left and 1 Harry and 1 Hermione down was Holly. They were working quietly on their Safety Solutions all hour when it came time to participate in Snape's favorite game-test it on the Gryffindors.

"Potter, drink a beaker of Weasley's potion. Black, you hex him," Snape said, sneering nastily.

"Professor I don't-" Holly began.

"No objections, Miss Black, you do as you are told! Up here, NOW!" he barked.

"Harry I'm so sorry if I did it wrong..." Ron whispered frantically. Harry took some of his potion and drank it. It was absolutely disgusting... it tasted like very old milk. He walked up to the front of the classroom and stood across from Holly, who was pulling her wand out of her pocket. She held her wand steady as she could and pointed it at Harry.

"Reversi Jointeim!" Holly said as softly as she could, as though the less power she put behind it the less it would hurt Harry. He recognized the incantation as that that would make his elbows bend backwards.

The potion obviously worked because as soon as Harry felt the spell hit him, it repelled and rocketed back at Holly. She dodged it, causing an empty glass jar on the shelf behind her to shatter. "Black!" said Snape angrily. "What do you think you're doing?!"

"I'm not sure...just trying to avoid having my elbows on backwards," she said, straightening up. "Was I forbiden to dodge my own hex?"

Snape fumed. "5 points from Gryffindor."

"For what?" Harry asked suddenly.

"All I did was avoid a hex and break an empty glass jar which can be repaired!" Holly stated, her eyes bulging. "Watch... Reparo!" The shards of glass flew together and the jar was instantly fixed.

"You shall not talk to me like that, and you are not to do uncalled for spells in class!" Snape spat. The bell rang.

"List to me at least 15 ways that Safety Solutions could come in use... due Tuesday," Snape said. Everyone packed up his or her things and left.

"The origins of his teaching have been lost in OBSCURITY!" Holly said, enraged.

"5 points from Gryffindor-what a load of shit," Ron said more to himself than anyone else.

"I can't believe you wouldn't even sacrifice yourself with a reversible hex for two seconds, Black," Malfoy sneered.

"That was lame, Malfoy," she snapped, "So shove off because I don't have the time or patience for you today."

He laughed and shook his head. "You don't have much for comebacks either."

"Look, Malfoy," Holly said through gritted teeth, "I have sacrificed more than you have in your life, and it may not be much that I've lost but at least I know how to live my life without being treated like a child, pampered, and spoiled."

"Just ignore him, Holly," Harry said, sounding a lot like Hermione. Malfoy grinned.

"Pride, Black. It will get you nowhere but into trouble unless you have pride in the right thing," he said.

"What-ev, Malfoy, just get out of my face," Holly said. She, Hermione, Harry, and Ron pushed their way past the Slytherins and none of them noticed Malfoy pulling his wand out of his pocket, directing it at Holly, and mumbling something under his breath.

"Thank God that was our last class for the next two days," Harry said.

"I'm going to go to the library, wanna come with Holly?" Hermione said.

"Yes, I think that's one place Malfoy wouldn't show up," she replied.

"Don't want to snog with him now, do you?" Ron assumed.

"Right you are... not until I kick his ass," Holly said.

"Like you could," Harry said. She smiled weakly at him.

"I'd just beat him over the head with my broomstick next time I see him-it will be enough," she said. Then she and Hermione turned off on a separate corridor to make their way to the library.

"I never asked you," Harry said, "How did it go with Almeda?" He and Ron were sitting in front of the fire after supper, only a few hours later.

"Terrible. I got all sweaty, started stuttering... I tried to cover by asking her if she finished her homework but she must have sensed something was going on. I couldn't ask her... after all this time... I just chickened out. I didn't have it in my," he said, looking down. Harry saw his ears go red.

"Oh, that's alright Ron...if you don't buck up and ask her there will be others," Harry said shrugging, trying to cheer him up. "Besides, it's best we keep our minds of girls with Quidditch practice starting tomorrow," he added.

"Yeah. I can't wait for your sister to pelt Quaffles at me while my own sister cheers her on..." Ron said, laughing.

"I imagine it will be an incredibly efficient and satisfying way to vent her anger," Harry said. "Maybe she'll enjoy it more than beating Malfoy over the head with her broomstick."

"Maybe... hey, when's the first Hogsmede trip?" Ron asked.

"Probably around Halloween, that's when it usually is," Harry said. "I dunno...why?"

"Just curious."

"Going to try your luck with asking out Almeda again?"

"Maybe," he replied, grinning in an embarrassed sort of way.

"Wonder where those girls got to...they weren't at supper."

"Possibly they're being mugged by hostile 4th years with bad haircuts!" Ron suggested. Harry laughed. "You never know..."

"That was poor," he replied.

"What if I added they were Slytherins?"

"Wouldn't help at all. Speaking of Slytherins... is it just me or is Malfoy looking more pale and skinny than usual, lately?" Harry said.

"Hmmm I haven't noticed. Guess they didn't feed him well in prison," Ron said. Harry snorted. "Better?"

"A little. Maybe he's nervous that the team he put together will, once again, be NO MATCH for the Gryffindors!"

"Yeah. 'We are the Slytherin Serpents, hear us HISS' has never sounded too ominous. Besides, I heard that he got Crabbe and Goyle as beaters... with those two oversized oafs on broomsticks each Slytherin match will be a laugh!"

"You're kidding!" Harry laughed, "They will be needing some practice. Oh, there are the girls..." he said. Ron turned his head and watched as Hermione and Holly clambered into the portrait hole, Holly with some difficulty. Harry waved for them to come over and they did so. "Where have you two been?"

"Library, where do you think?" Hermione said. "We finished up our homework... and good thing because Holly's lookin tired."

"Tired? It's only 9:00!" Ron said.

"I realize that," Holly said, rubbing her eyes. "I just feel really wore out. I'm goin to bed..." she said.

"Aren't you hungry?" Harry asked. She shook her head and yawned. "Well, might as well get some sleep, we have practice tomorrow morning and you'll need to be full-charged."

"Thanks, Captain," she said with a very weak smile before she turned on her heel and walked slowly to the stairs that led up to the girls' dormitories.

"Have you thought up any plays we could try and put into action for the team yet, Harry?" Ron asked.

"Yeah a couple... I don't think I can be as good of a captain as Wood or Angelina... but I'll give it a try," Harry said.

"You'll do fine, don't worry about it," Hermione said, sitting on the floor with her bag in her lap. "You've put together a great team, boys."

At around 7:00 the next morning Holly woke up, ready for the day. She walked half-blinded in front of the mirror and started to rub her eyes. "What did you do, Holly, you look awful!" it exclaimed.

"What's that Willow?" she said, blinking and looking up. She saw her reflection and screamed.

In the boys' dormitory, Harry bolted awake. "Was that Holly?" he asked frantically. He could hear Ron stirring behind his four-poster's curtains.

"I dunno...don't all girls scream the same?" he mumbled. Harry got up, put on his glasses and sprinted to the girls' dormitory, shirtless and sleepy but not caring. He heard a jumble of voices and knocked.

There was a sudden silence and some shuffling. "Who is it?" came Lavender's voice.

"Harry, now please can I come in? What's wrong?" he said. There was some more shuffling and Harry figured the girls were trying to make themselves look half-decent and then he looked down at his ensemble and realized they had no need to. He opened the door.

"What's going on?" he asked, stepping inside. Parvati, Lavender, and Hermione were standing in a line in front of Holly's bed. "Where's Holly?"

"Uh..." Hermione said, "Not here."

"Yeah right, where is she?"

"You aren't supposed to be in here," prompted Parvati. It was then when he heard a sniffle from behind the girls and they tightened their group.

"Holly?" he said, "Holly, what's wrong." There was some brief shuffling. "Come on, Holly, tell me." She mumbled something and he couldn't hear what it was. "What?"

Finally she slowly stood up and walked through the girls. Harry gawked at her as she made herself seen. There were tears streaked down her cheeks and her hair was a vivid emerald green. He had to push the urge to laugh down. "What happened to you?"

"My hair turned green, dumb-ass, what does it look like?" she snapped, although her voice was very shaky.

"I can see that...you didn't do that yourself?" he said.

"Why the hell would I do this to myself!?" she exclaimed. Then Ron opened the door.

"Ever hear of knocking?" Lavender said.

"Urgency overrules propriety, whassamatter?" he asked, slowly. Holly tried frantically to escape from view but to no success because soon Ron was staring at her, open-mouthed. "Whoa..." he said. Ron couldn't help but stifle a short snort.

"Yes, my hair is green, now could you stop gaping at me and help me come up with an explanation!?" she said.

"Well obviously it's the Dae Macindrel jinx..." Hermione said.

"What the hell is that?" Ron asked, sleepily.

"It's a jinx that turns your hair green, quick one," Holly said, trying to wipe the tears off of her cheeks. "Can it be reversed?"

"I think so...you'll have to go and see Professor McGonagall though. She'd know what to do, I'm sure," Hermione said matter-of-factly.

"I'm not leaving this room until my hair is brown again, thanks," she said.

"Come on Holly, it's not that bad. Just pull your robes up over your head and run for it!" Lavender said cheerfully. Holly glared at her.

"Malfoy," said Harry suddenly. "I bet he whipped out his wand and jinxed you right after you walked past him yesterday!"

"Ha! Probably," said Ron, "See what you get for thinking he's handsome? BETRAYAL!"

"Kiss mine, Ron," she mumbled, sitting down in one of the 4 wooden chairs in the room.

"I say you get to McGonagall's office before the rest of the house wakes up and makes their way into the common room to see what's going on," Parvati said.

"Yeah, come on, Holly, I'll go with you," said Hermione.

"Us too," said Ron.

"What would you want to come with for?" Holly sniffed.

"Moral support," he stated.

After a short pause Holly agreed with a "FINE!" and the 3 of them marched her down the stairs and to Professor McGonagall's office, Ron and Harry still shirtless.

"Hope the fact that I'm bearing half my body here is cheering you up, woman," Ron said. Holly managed to snicker faintly.

"Not really, it's embarrassing," she said, winking at him.

"Whatever you're loving it!" Ron insisted, smiling in an innocently seductive way.

"Shut it, Freckles," she replied with a grin. But after only seconds she was sniffling again, and kept on grabbing a chunk of her long hair and looking at it.

Harry had been to McGonagall's office a couple times before; it was only a floor above the entrance to the Gryffindor common room. When they reached the door, Hermione knocked, and Professor McGonagall opened it, already fully dressed but she wasn't through with pulling her hair into a tight bun. She looked quite strange to the 4 of them, as they had never seen her with her hair any other way.

"Oh my goodness!" she said, looking at Holly. "Come in! What on earth happened?"

"We think Draco Malfoy hit her with the Dae Macindrel jinx, Professor. They got angry with each other yesterday after our last class, Potions, and we think he jinxed her when she passed," Hermione explained.

"How can you be sure?"

"My hair is green?" Holly said.

"No, no," Professor McGonagall said, shaking her head, "How do you know it was Mr. Malfoy who did this to you?"

"Well, first off, I didn't do it to myself," Holly said, frowning. "Second... after Potions I didn't come in close contact with any other people other than Hermione, Ron, and Harry, really. I don't think any Gryffindor would do this to me either! And besides, more than 12 hours have passed since after Potions and within 8 hours the jinx is supposed to kick in, only if you're asleep. And, well, I went to bed around 9."

"Sounds sufficient... you and Mr. Malfoy detest each other, do you?" she asked.

"Well, we don't get along very well, no..." Holly stated. "But, more importantly, can you reverse this PLEASE?!"

"Of course, Miss Black," she said. Holly let out a great sigh of relief. "But your hair will be that color for a week or two before it goes back, and it will not change back to it's original color...normally it turns the color of which your hair was when it first started growing when you were only a baby." Now Holly didn't look so relieved.

"A WEEK!?" Holly burst. "A WEEK? But...but... I can't go to classes like this!!!" she shrieked.

"I'm sorry, Black, but there's no other choice. The reverse spell kicks in right away but it takes a while to work. Your hair will change colors a streak at a time. The longer you sit there complaining about the conditions the longer it will be until it is back to a human shade. Come here and I will perform the reversal," Professor McGonagall said.

Holly stood up, tears in her eyes once more, and walked forward. Professor McGonagall tapped a strand of her hair twice and said, "Antecedente!"

"You may go. I'm sorry for the inconvenience of this counter, Miss Black." Holly gave the Professor one last fleeting look of desperation and then followed Harry, Ron, and Hermione out the door.

"My - life - is - OVER!" Holly said.

"Oh, it could be worse... you could have Pansy's stringy hair or something," Hermione said.

"Or her nose," Ron substituted.

"What if my hair starts turning red? I can't have red hair! I'll look like YOU!" she said, her eyes bugging out and gazing at Ron's red hair, which was hanging in his eyes, somewhat.

"That's only a wistful fantasy you could hope for, Holly. Looking like me...what a joke! And if your hair did turn red, you'd look like a Christmas scarf, remember it starts showing in streaks! Haaa! I'm going to keep that image in my mind..." Ron said, shutting his eyes and smiling.

She punched him in the arm. "Be quiet Ron you're making me mad. I'm going to go back to the dormitory, change into some normal clothes and put my hair in a pony tail then go down to breakfast before too many people are up..."

"Good idea," said Harry, "We'll meet you at the table... since we're up."

They went back into the common room and met most of the house there. Apparently they had heard Holly's scream and woke up to see what had happened. Holly blushed as people caught sight of her, and ran up to the stairs to her dormitory. "'Mione, what doesn't clash with green? Ah yes...white..." she said, pulling a white v-neck tee out of her wardrobe. "Ugh...I hate being plain."

"Holly, you have green hair-there's nothing to worry about," Hermione said.

"I need khakis..." she mumbled to herself, digging in her wardrobe for a good pair of pants. When she found what she was looking for she ran in front of the mirror, holding separate hangers each holding a piece of clothing. "Willow, how does this look?" she asked.

"Wonderful dear with the exception of your hair..." the mirror replied.

"I'm working on it, all right?!" she said, dropping her arms to her sides.

"Holly's hair is green?" Seamus asked, as he burst in through the boys' dormitory door.

"Yes...now can we talk about something else?" Harry said, easily grabbing a pair of pants and a shirt, not putting nearly as much time and effort into his wardrobe as Holly and Hermione were presently.

He changed and went down into the common room with Ron to wait for the girls.

"Why do you wear your watch like that?" Hermione asked as she watched Holly putting her watch on with the dial on the inside of her wrist.

"What? Do I have to have a reason for everything?" she said. Hermione shrugged. "I'm mainlining to kill right now... don't ask me stupid questions." Hermione laughed quietly and followed Holly out the door.

"About time," Ron said. "Come on...I'm hungry now..." he said. It was about 8:00. Holly tried to act as if everyone wasn't staring at her, but urged everyone to get moving. They made their way to the Great Hall to find it half-full already. "You should have hurried up!" Ron exclaimed.

"You're not the one with a head full of green hair, so no worries!" Holly said lightly. As the Slytherin table caught sight of them they all started to laugh and point. They sat down at the table and started dishing up.

"This is not enjoyable..." Holly mumbled, looking around. "My lord I'm cutting up my bacon..." They ate pretty silently with a comment to one another here and there.

"Dear, dear, Black... green is really not your color," drawled Malfoy as he approached the table, grinning from ear to ear.

"And I bet black and blue isn't yours..." Holly said, moving as though to get up from the table but Harry grabbed her arm before she could do anything stupid-which Holly was very apt to doing. Malfoy snickered.

"How is your pride doing now?" he asked.

"Hasn't been diminished at all! In fact... I'm as slap-happy as ever before," Holly said in a would-be cheerful voice if she didn't look so angry. "How's your pride? It must be nice you can jinx a moving target now, eh?"

Malfoy smiled and shrugged, before walking away, Crabbe and Goyle tailing him as usual. "Let's go and see Hagrid before practice... I imagine he could do with a laugh," Holly said. How she had suddenly become perfectly fine with the fact her hair was emerald-green, not even she was sure.

"Good idea," Hermione said. They got up from their table, exited through the Entrance Hall and jogged down the sloping grounds to Hagrid's cabin by the Forbidden Forest. Ron banged his fist on Hagrid's door three times and they stood back and waited. Nothing. He pounded on the door again. No answer.

"Where is he?" Harry asked. Ron shrugged. "Hagrid!" he said, pressing his ear against the door to listen for any sounds. "Hagrid!? Are you in there?" He sighed and stepped back away from the door.

"Wonder where he is..." Hermione said curiously. They walked around to the back of Hagrid's small hut and saw Reldov still tied to the tree, looking edgy. "What's wrong, Reldov?" Hermione asked, soothingly. Reldov pawed the ground and looked towards the forest.

It was then when they heard a great bark and hurrying footsteps. They all turned their heads and saw Hagrid exiting the Forbidden Forest, walking very quickly, with Fang the Boarhound running by his side.

"Hagrid!" Holly exclaimed, "Where were you?"

"Paris, Holly. He was in Paris," Ron said, rolling his eyes.

"Good gawd, Holly, what did yeh do to yer hair?" Hagrid panted, as he approached them.

"Oh. Malfoy jinxed me yesterday...ugh... Dae Macindrel it was...but what were you doing in the forest?" she asked.

"Talkin' with Aragog..." he explained. "Come inside, I'll tell yeh abou' it," he said. Ron shuddered.

They followed Hagrid inside and pulled up chairs at his table. "We can't stay too long, Hagrid - Ron, Holly, and I have to go to Quidditch practice," Harry stated, watching Hagrid make tea.

"What were you doing in the forest and who is Aragog?" Holly demanded.

"Aragog is an acromantula..." Hagrid began.

"You talked to an acromantula...?" Holly said, eyes wide and jaw dropped. "But those are deadly..."

"No lie..." Ron agreed under his breath.

"No' Aragog...he's calm 'n' tamed. He wouldn't hurt me-I raised 'im. He and 'is family are scared 'bout somethin'. They tell me there's somthin' fishy goin' on in that forest... they can sense it. There's summat there tha' don' belong there... they're all panickin' like you've ne'er seen," Hagrid explained gruffly.

"The only thing I've ever heard acromantulas being afraid of are basilisks... and honestly I don't think there's a basilisk slithering around the grounds..." Holly said slowly.

"It's not jus' them. The centaurs... they know somethin' too... bu' yer can't try an' get a straight answer from one of 'em... bu' they are worryin' too. Ronan an' Bane are a mess... they're sayin' tha' other centaurs are beginnin' to fleet..." Hagrid shook his great shaggy head. "I don' like it. Danger is always lurkin' 'round Hogwarts... Dumbledore present or not. But in all my days..." he trailed off.

"What?" Ron said, looking fearful.

"Nothin'. Don't you worry... nothin' in tha' forest is gonna come any closer ter the castle than it is righ' now..." Hagrid said. He looked a bit uncomfortable. Holly, Ron, Harry, and Hermione all gazed at him for a while... hoping to hear more.

"Er..." Harry said awkwardly, "Any new creatures?"

"Nice, Harry," Ron said.

"Well, I go' some puffskeins out back for the 3rd years to play with nex' lesson..."

Holly gasped. "Can we go see them!?" she squeaked.

"Sure..." Hagrid said. He led them out to the back of his house where there was a large box. Hagrid opened it up and inside were 5 round little creatures covered in custard-colored fur. They looked very fuzzy and friendly.

"Oh, they're so sweet!" Holly said smiling, bending down and swooping the smallest one into her arms.

"I had a puffskein once..." Ron said, mournfully. Harry sniggered.

"Oh...what happened to it?" Hermione asked.

"Fred used it for Bludger practice..." he replied grimly. Holly and Hermione both gasped, an identical look of horror on each of their faces. Hermione picked up a puffskein and snuggled with it.

"These are so sweet..." Holly said, cuddling with the little fuzz-ball that she cradled in her arms as though it were a very round very furry baby. Ron picked up a particularly fat puffskein and smiled at it.

"This one reminds me of my Pat-Pat," he said looking down at the round little creature. He threw it up into the air and catching it. It hummed contentedly. Harry sniggered.

"Your puffskein's name was Pat-Pat?" Harry asked.

"Yep..." Ron said, smiling warmly at the chubby puffskein.

"You named it Pat-Pat?" Harry said, laughing.

"Ginny did," Ron said very quickly.

"They ar' cute lil' buggers... no' very interestin' though..." Hagrid said, holding one in his large hand.

"Oh come on, they eat your bogies when you're sleeping! What could possibly be more interesting?!" Ron said. The group laughed.

"Ish...yuck!" Holly said in between laughs, "Stop that!" The puffskein was licking at her hair.

"S'pose your head looks like a giant snotter to it," Harry said, laughing at her attempts to hold the puffskein far enough away so it's long, pink tongue couldn't reach her. "You know, now that all your hair is green."

"EMERALD!" Holly corrected. "My hair, is EMERALD! And I do not believe that is the color of boogers, all right!?"

"Whatever-it's green," Ron said.

"It's beautiful," Hermione sniggered. The puffskein was trying to pull Holly's ponytail into its mouth now, and she was positively mortified. Harry had to pull it off of her.

"That's it, I want a new one of those!" Holly said, picking a different puffskein. This one didn't try to devour her hair right off the bat, to her relief. She started playing catch with Harry, the puffskein humming happily the entire time.

They visited with Hagrid for another half-hour or so before they left. There was no more mention of what happened in the Forbidden forest, and the girls were very reluctant to leave the puffskeins. Hagrid promised that they could come back and play with them any time. "I'm going to go to the library and look up some stuff on acromantulas... there has to be certain things they can sense better than others-it might be a hint as to what new thing is in the forest..." Hermione said.

"That sounds good," Harry said, agreeing to her idea. "Could you check out some astronomy or divination books too? One with a chart of how the planets should be positioned in certain months... we can look into what the centaurs are seeing... maybe Ron or I could ask Professor Trelawney to tell us what is written in the skies with the alignments."

"Nothing good, I'll bet you," Ron said, shaking his head and frowning. "We'll see you after practice," he added.

"Yep, bye! Practice hard," Hermione said. They grinned at her and split for the common room. They all grabbed their brooms, and Harry found the diagrams of the few plays he had formed.

They grouped up again in the common room and headed out to the pitch, a bit early, so they could wait for the rest of the team to show up. "What are we going to do about robes?" Holly asked.

"There's some in the locker rooms... we'll all just have to find a set that's close to our size before we start practice," Harry said, shrugging.

"I bet they're enchanted to fit you," Ron stated thoughtfully.

"Best get one close to your size anyway," Harry urged.

Holly was humming to herself, perfectly happy again. So happy, in fact, she found it in herself to be extra-nice to Ron. Maybe that was because she had a feeling there was no newly formed relationship between he and Almeda Darrels, or maybe she was suffering from some weird after-effect of the Dae Macindrel jinx.

They could see the rest of the team approaching now. Ginny and Seamus walked side-by-side, and Harry felt a pang of jealousy then tried his hardest to push it to the back of his senses, thinking "What is wrong with you?!" Brandon and Cameron followed. Harry tried to draw himself up to his fullest, attempting to make a determined and competitive impression like Oliver Wood, his first captain, had.

"Ready for our first practice session?" Harry asked, feeling important, as they approached.

"You bet," said Cameron the 5th year Beater.

Brandon the 4th year chaser pushed his hair out of his face and said, "When do we get started?"

"Well, first off I think we should go into the locker rooms and find us all some well-fitting robes. Ron, you help Brandon and Cameron, I'll help Ginny and Holly. We'll get our own afterward," Harry said. They made their way to the side of the pitch and started looking for robes.

"Hmmm, these look your size," Harry said, handing Ginny a set of robes. She looked them over, checking for tears or frayed ends, but finding none, she left to try them on and came back, looking ready and able to play her hardest.

"Try these, Holly," Harry said. Holly took the robes he was holding and gazed at them.

"Too short!" she said.

"Just try them," Harry protested, giving her a meaningful look.

"Harry! They are too short!" she insisted. She held the robes up to her, and sure enough they would probably be hanging a good deal above her ankles. He picked some longer robes and handed them to her.

"Those will be too big," he said. They looked about to fit Millicent Bulstrode.

"If they're enchanted to fit I think I'll be fine," she said, smiling at him in very superior way and stalking off to change. When she came out, sure enough, they fit fine. "Told ya!" she shouted across the locker room. Her green hair looked horrible against the scarlet robes with gold trim. Harry was at the next wardrobe, going through robes with Ron. They both found the right size and left to change.

When the entire team was ready, they went back out onto the field and Harry conjured a sort of easel to present to them his planned moves and tactics. He was glad they all paid him good attention-he didn't want them nodding off. After they discussed their maneuvers and Ron suggested that the other members might try and come up with new plays in their spare time ("The more plays we have, the easier it will be to confuse our opponents!" he said. "And ourselves," Ginny mumbled in addition.).

When they had finally mounted their brooms, excitement flooded through Harry. "3 warm-up laps! Top speed!" he said. "Go!" he said. They all rocketed around the pitch, flattened on their brooms, and Harry was very impressed in the team he had formed. After a little practice, he knew the cup was theirs.

The practice went through pretty well. They worked a little on each play Harry had devised ("I hate this! 'Stay at 80 feet and prepare for the ball to come your way... don't move an inch until the signal,' what a RETARDED play position! I'm a CHASER not a Sitter!" Holly complained at one play.) and they all went fairly well. Seamus and Cameron worked hard on their precision in beating the Bludgers on target. Holly, Ginny, and Brandon pelted the Quaffle around like baseball pitchers, more than ½ of them straight-on target. Ron saved about 80% of the intended scoring. Harry caught the Snitch continually, not giving it a full minute's break.

When the touched back down to ground, Ron told them their practice schedules and Harry congratulated everyone on a good first practice, but urged them all to memorize their moves, because they still needed improvement. They changed out of their robes and left for the Gryffindor Tower to drop off their things before a much-needed lunch.

It wasn't until Hermione joined them mid-way through lunch with some interesting news that they had something new to think about.